https://jabberpowered.org/ What XMPP is, where Jabber came from, how to run a federated server and how the XSF turns an idea into a XEP. Written from the RFCs and the specifications. en https://jabberpowered.org/clients/opening-the-archive-on-your-disk/https://jabberpowered.org/clients/opening-the-archive-on-your-disk/Tue, 15 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000What a desktop client keeps on your own disk, why a plain database file survives, and how to inspect it read only with an ordinary database tool. https://jabberpowered.org/clients/what-an-accessible-client-owes/https://jabberpowered.org/clients/what-an-accessible-client-owes/Tue, 15 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000What a chat client owes a reader who did not build it: keyboard use, screen reader labels, contrast, text size, captions, and a first review a volunteer team https://jabberpowered.org/history/free-nets-and-public-terminals/https://jabberpowered.org/history/free-nets-and-public-terminals/Tue, 15 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000How free-nets ran on volunteer labour, dial up lines and library terminals, and why a federated address still works the same way. https://jabberpowered.org/protocol/who-issues-a-digital-identity/https://jabberpowered.org/protocol/who-issues-a-digital-identity/Tue, 15 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000Authenticating, activating and signing are three different acts. The harder question is who is allowed to issue an identity, and what happens when the issuer https://jabberpowered.org/servers/what-one-node-can-see/https://jabberpowered.org/servers/what-one-node-can-see/Tue, 15 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000A server sees its own queues and stanzas in full, and infers the rest. Resolution and revisit set the limits, exactly as they do in Earth observation. https://jabberpowered.org/standards/the-procedure-before-the-transfer/https://jabberpowered.org/standards/the-procedure-before-the-transfer/Tue, 15 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000Two independent systems can only exchange anything once a published, dated document fixes the coupling, the sequence and the rendezvous in advance. https://jabberpowered.org/clients/animated-avatars-gif/https://jabberpowered.org/clients/animated-avatars-gif/Sat, 12 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000An avatar is a small image published per account; whether it moves is a client decision. What the standards say and where the animation lives. https://jabberpowered.org/clients/choosing-where-account-lives/https://jabberpowered.org/clients/choosing-where-account-lives/Sat, 12 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000On a federated network the first decision is not the app but the server holding the account. How to read a small service like a neighbourhood. https://jabberpowered.org/history/community-radio-federation/https://jabberpowered.org/history/community-radio-federation/Sat, 12 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000Low-power FM licences put a hundred-watt transmitter in local hands. The structure of that decision is older than federation and explains part of it. https://jabberpowered.org/history/digital-archaeology-protocols/https://jabberpowered.org/history/digital-archaeology-protocols/Sat, 12 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000Deprecated XEPs, abandoned services and expired domains are a federated network's stratigraphy. Reading them takes a field archaeologist's patience. https://jabberpowered.org/history/reading-rfcs-like-historian/https://jabberpowered.org/history/reading-rfcs-like-historian/Sat, 12 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000The RFCs are primary documents and most retellings are secondary. How a historian reads a primary text, and why it applies to a specification. https://jabberpowered.org/servers/domain-and-dns-first/https://jabberpowered.org/servers/domain-and-dns-first/Sat, 12 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000Before any XMPP software is installed, a federated node needs a registered domain, DNS records under the operator's control and a host that answers. https://jabberpowered.org/servers/weekly-maintenance-round/https://jabberpowered.org/servers/weekly-maintenance-round/Sat, 12 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000A small XMPP server fails by neglect more often than by attack: certificates expire, logs fill, updates wait. A fixed weekly round is the difference. https://jabberpowered.org/servers/when-two-servers-stop-talking/https://jabberpowered.org/servers/when-two-servers-stop-talking/Sat, 12 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000Federation failures look identical from outside and have four causes underneath. A diagnostic order that reads the pipes before digging. https://jabberpowered.org/standards/blocklists-name-not-behaviour/https://jabberpowered.org/standards/blocklists-name-not-behaviour/Sat, 12 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000Operators block abusive domains and users block abusive contacts. Whether the block names a category or an act is the difference that matters. https://jabberpowered.org/protocol/message-presence-and-iq/https://jabberpowered.org/protocol/message-presence-and-iq/Tue, 01 Sep 2026 09:00:00 +0000The three stanza types defined by RFC 6120 and what each one is actually for, with the attributes that decide where a stanza goes. https://jabberpowered.org/protocol/how-a-jid-is-built/https://jabberpowered.org/protocol/how-a-jid-is-built/Wed, 26 Aug 2026 09:00:00 +0000Localpart, domainpart and resourcepart: what RFC 7622 allows in each, why bare and full addresses behave differently, and where clients get it wrong. https://jabberpowered.org/protocol/presence-and-subscriptions/https://jabberpowered.org/protocol/presence-and-subscriptions/Wed, 19 Aug 2026 09:00:00 +0000How a contact list is stored on the server, what the four subscription states mean, and the exact exchange that adds one person to another list. https://jabberpowered.org/history/from-jabberd-to-the-xmpp-rfcs/https://jabberpowered.org/history/from-jabberd-to-the-xmpp-rfcs/Wed, 12 Aug 2026 09:00:00 +0000The dated steps between the 1999 announcement of Jabber and the 2004 publication of the first XMPP RFCs, as the XSF records them. https://jabberpowered.org/history/who-owns-the-name-jabber/https://jabberpowered.org/history/who-owns-the-name-jabber/Wed, 05 Aug 2026 09:00:00 +0000Why the protocol is called XMPP and the community is still called Jabber: the trademark, the foundation that licensed it, and who holds it now. https://jabberpowered.org/servers/ejabberd-prosody-openfire/https://jabberpowered.org/servers/ejabberd-prosody-openfire/Wed, 29 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000What separates the three servers people deploy, why no neutral body has measured it, and how to run the comparison yourself. https://jabberpowered.org/servers/dns-records-a-federated-server-needs/https://jabberpowered.org/servers/dns-records-a-federated-server-needs/Wed, 22 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000The SRV records XMPP uses for client and server connections, the fallback rules in RFC 6120, and the mistakes that quietly break federation. https://jabberpowered.org/servers/encryption-on-the-wire/https://jabberpowered.org/servers/encryption-on-the-wire/Wed, 15 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000The two hops an XMPP message takes, what TLS protects on each, what dialback does and does not prove, and where transport encryption stops. https://jabberpowered.org/clients/what-to-check-before-you-install/https://jabberpowered.org/clients/what-to-check-before-you-install/Wed, 08 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000The handful of extensions that decide whether an XMPP client feels modern: message archiving, carbons, http upload and encryption support. https://jabberpowered.org/clients/why-mobile-xmpp-is-harder/https://jabberpowered.org/clients/why-mobile-xmpp-is-harder/Wed, 01 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000Long lived streams against aggressive power management: what stream management and push notifications solve, and what they cost. https://jabberpowered.org/standards/how-a-xep-becomes-a-standard/https://jabberpowered.org/standards/how-a-xep-becomes-a-standard/Wed, 24 Jun 2026 09:00:00 +0000The states an extension passes through at the XSF, who votes at each step, and how to read the status block at the top of any XEP. https://jabberpowered.org/standards/muc-and-mix-group-chat/https://jabberpowered.org/standards/muc-and-mix-group-chat/Wed, 17 Jun 2026 09:00:00 +0000Why XMPP has two group chat extensions, what each assumes about identity and membership, and what that means for a user with two devices. https://jabberpowered.org/standards/omemo-and-end-to-end-encryption/https://jabberpowered.org/standards/omemo-and-end-to-end-encryption/Wed, 10 Jun 2026 09:00:00 +0000What OMEMO adds on top of transport encryption, how it handles several devices per account, and the parts of a conversation it does not hide.